LINKS

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Guides

This
is my basic guide on what drives development and developers.
It includes a guide to viability appraisals. This latest version
has been drafted to support the forthcoming RTPI online course on
viability and also includes numerous corrections and updates.

NB These audio
podcasts are in mp3 format
and downloadable (righ click and select 'save as') and should also play
in your browser if you simply click on the link. At present the sound
quality varies a bit; my apologies for that. They were updated in 2014.These are transcripts for each podcast.

I
was commissioned to write this by the RICS and trust that it does what
is says on the tin although it is now a little long in the tooth.
The full version of the Guide is here. There is a summary, which is probably too brief to be useful
here.

Getting Schemes Moving AgainThis
short note covers some of the things that a planning authority might
want to think about when trying to kick start larger scale housing
development

Two simple appraisal models that were used on the PAS course on
viability skills for planners and tidied up for me by Phil Wallbridge at
Roger Tym & Partnersplus a variation on the commercial model using a wider range of variables.

This
guide runs through typical requirements and costs for a wide
variety of types
of social and open space facilities, the main exception being
transport. These costs estimates are now well out of date and frankly I
have only left this here because there seems to be few other sources of
this information. You can update these figures using the links
construction cost inflation indices further down this page.

Sources of Data for Appraisals

The
VOA Property Market Reports used to provide an invaluable useful
snapshot of market
movements and an indication (no more than that) of typical land prices
based on historic data. This seesm to have become a vicitim of
budget cuts so the link here is now to the Government Statistics
archive where you can find some of the (less valuable) reports that
they still produce.

Free
registration on the Building Magazine website gives you access to a
wealth of cost case studies and data on construction cost inflation
etc. The case studies are especially useful because - unlike with
BCIS - you can see exactly what is being costed with a detailed
breakdown. Note that this link takes to to a dead page if you haven't registered first. HCA 'Development Appraisal Tool'

This
is the HCA appraisal model. It is useful for smaller scale and short
term projects with a significant affordable housing content.

The
UK's largest auctioneers. Their back-catalogue provides a great
repository of information on the prices obtained for less fashionable
commercial properties across the UK which are very useful when
trying to establish
existing values, or gauging competition from existing property to
a new scheme. There is also a residential auction site but I find this
less useful.

It is amazing how little effort is made to nullify
the many biases are brought to viability assessments. This excellent
slideshow from Business Insider highlights some of these. Take a look.
If you don't think that your are guilty of a dozen or so ............

Smart New HomesandNew Homes for SaleThese
sites aggregate details of new homes on the market. Their details, or
the details on the websites of the various developers they link to,
usually give you enough information to work out the asking price on
a per square metre basis for comparison puproses.

The
RICS Surveys are useful because, being based on a poll of agents who
are active in the market, they provide a forward looking survey of
market conditions. The navigation within the RICS site is notoriously
bad, so don't stray too far!

Mott MacDonaldFranklin
& Andrews used to provide a good, free guide to build costs on
request. It was
called the 'Little Black Book'. They were then taken over by Mott
MacDonald who still produce guides but on a much more sporadic basis so
the most recent guide might be out of date albiet useful if you make an
inflation adjustment.

This
Report provides useful information on typical costs
for remediating of contaminated sites. I have posted it on my
site because the search facility for documents on the HCA site is so
utterly useless.

This
online service from the Cambridge Centre for housing &
Planning Research provides data on rents for social and market rental
property across the UK plus access to wealth of general reasearch on
housing and planning.

Other Interesting & Useful Stuff

This
piece written in 2000 by John Henneberry and Simon Guy for the RICS
'Cutting Edge' series of papers makes the case for
cultivating local development firms to offset the negative
effects on development of remote investors systematically
over-estimating risks and missing opportunities.

This
is an excellent paper by Neil Crosby and Peter Wyatt, two professors of
Real Estate at the Henley Business School University of Reading. They
point to flaws in the models that are often used in the planning
process and which professionals are often reluctant to accept,
particularly in relation to the estimation of threshold land values.
This link takes you to the RICS website where you should be able to
download it. Strangely (or not, depending on your point of view) the
RICS don't seem too keen to give this much prominence.

This
article by Pat McAllister & Peter Wyatt of Univ.of Reading appeared
in RICS Business in June 2010. It summarises (accurately in my view)
the shortcomings of the traditional approaches to appraisal in the
planning context.

In
seminars I am often asked technical questions about the economics of
the housebuilding industry. In 2008 the Office for Fair Trading
commissioned a review of the topic by John Calcutt, a former Chief
Executive of Crest Nicolson and the Housing Corporation. Annexes E (on
Financing) and O (on claculaying residual land values) are most useful.
Links below.

The
Londson School of Economics host public lectures on economics and
related issues. Two are particularly relevant to my interests.

In
February 2014 Paul Cheshire, a Professor at the LSE, demonstrated the
entertaining proposition that trophy archites add nothing to the
economic value of tall buildings in London, but did succeed in
extracting permision for much higher buildings from the planning
system.